Marketing Tips

Listed below are the archived "Cool Tips of the Week", which is a bi-weekly email sent by Steve Miller to IMTS Exhibitors with helpful hits on making the best of your IMTS Experience. Steve Miller is the President of The Adventure, the author of HOW TO GET THE MOST OUT OF TRADE SHOWS and the keynote speaker at the IMTS 2008 Exhibitor's Workshop.

If you are an IMTS 2008 Exhibitor and want to be added to this email list please send an email to jaybar@amtonline.org.

Staffing

Staffers
When an attendee walks by or into your exhibit, can they tell who works there? I know the "business uniform" is a coat and tie, but if staffers look like everybody else, then you're making it difficult for attendees to find them. Look for ways to make staffers distinctive - matching golf shirts, sweaters, hats, blazers, large, custom-designed name badges, or even wearing red chrysanthemums can help. Another side benefit: staffers can't "hide" by blending in with the crowd!

Staffers
Most exhibitors think the average time with an attendee is under three minutes. Yet studies show that attendees say it's closer to 19 minutes! Attendees think in terms of QUALITY conversations, while exhibitors think about quantity. Attendees are saying "Give me a reason and I'll give you the time." If you've engaged with a quality attendee/prospect, don't be in a hurry to end the encounter. Taking a little more time helps create a better relationship, allows staffers to gather better information, and helps set up a clearer post-show follow-up plan.

Staffers
Quality and quantity are inversely proportional. I'm talking about quality of LEADS versus quantity. It makes a lot mores sense to encourage your staffers to take more time talking with attendees to find those high-quality prospects that you are really looking for. One Fortune 100 company I worked with recently set a goal of only 120 post-show appointments, even though they had a 6000 square-foot booth and 60 staffers. Those 120 appointments are much more valuable than 3,000 swiped badges.

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